Mining Worthy Ideas

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The classic writing style, as advocated by Pinker, focuses on peers describing cool things concretely to facilitate understanding. In academic papers, there is usually a structured flow with an abstract, introduction, analysis, and conclusion. Different subjects, like finance and humanities, have varying levels of complexity in their writing. By deeply exploring and referencing worthy ideas like Stiglitz's paper from 1980 and the concept of wisdom of crowds, one can mine these ideas for decades, relating back to concepts like market efficiency in finance.

Perhaps the best-kept secret of any writer is the ability to find inspiration in unconventional places. And that’s Michael Mauboussin in a nutshell. Investing, business, reading, writing, luck, skill — name a topic he’s passionate about, and he’s found a way to make money from it in his writing.

How? By subverting “The Curse of Knowledge.”

With his decades-long career on Wall Street, you’d think that reading Michael’s work would be like trying to learn Latin on the fly. But the opposite is true.

“I put my arm around the reader, and we gaze off into the world and say, “Let’s talk about what we see. Let’s make this concrete and interesting.”

No stuffy professionalism. No robotic jargon. While many of us writers see the ignorance of a reader as a handicap, Michael sees it as an opportunity. And as a result, he’s become a billboard for how to build a career around who you truly are and what you’re actually interested in.

In this episode, you’ll learn how to do the same. Come learn tactical writing and life instruction from one of Wall Street’s best and brightest.

SPEAKER LINKS:

Website: https://www.michaelmauboussin.com/

Books: https://www.michaelmauboussin.com/books

Twitter: https://twitter.com/mjmauboussin

WRITE OF PASSAGE:

Want to learn more about the next class Write of Passage?

Click here: https://take.writeofpassage.school/writing-sprints

PODCAST LINKS:

Website: https://writeofpassage.school/how-i-write/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DavidPerellChannel/videos

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-i-write/id1700171470